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Travelling in Mexico: Part 1

When I was at uni I went to live in Mexico City as part of an international exchange program; my plan was to live there for 1 year but I ended up staying for almost 2 years. This was one of the best experiences of my life! I travelled around the country, made friends from all around the wold and tried all kinds of amazing food – I also met my hubby there 🙂 -. Needless to say, Mexico has a special place in my heart and we love visiting the country whenever we have the chance, going to places that we’ve already been but also discovering new ones.

We kicked off our travels flying to the south of Mexico City to Oaxaca, which is a town best known for its indigenous people, handicrafts and amazing food. Walking around the city centre we were faced with an explosion of colour, not only the buildings are painted with bright colours but the handicrafts and the way people dress are also very colourful and cheerful. Every day there seemed to be a fair in front of the church of Santo Domingo with scores of people selling helium balloons, plastic balls and other small trinkets. There were also carts selling snacks, dance performances and people relaxing either chatting with friends or taking a nap.

As I said, Oaxaca is very well know in Mexico for its cuisine. The best food is to be found at the market so that’s where we headed upon arrival. I had a tlayuda which looks similar to a pizza but it has major differences. It’s a tortilla based dish covered with a layer of refried beans and topped with Oaxacan cheese, avocado, tomato and meat. There are many variations of the tlayuda and the portions are so big, that I really recommend sharing. Other well know dishes from the region are mole, tamales, tejate, etc.

We booked a tour to visit Hierve el Agua which is an amazing rock formation that looks like water boiling – hence the name – and where there’re small pools with fresh water running underneath. To be honest, the water is freezing cold and in the dry season it can be dirty because there’s no clean water running from the mountain, but even if you’re not interested in swimming/bathing the view is breathtaking.

The tour also included stopping to see the widest tree in the world – the Tule tree -, visiting Mitla, an archeological site and visiting a small rug workshop. I really enjoyed visiting the rug shop, where they showed us how they get the dyes of the wool naturally and the process to make a rug from start to finish. We bought a beautiful rug that I’m going to hang in the living room of our house in Hong Kong when I have time.

Our next stop was Mexico City where we visited Teotihuacán, Xochimilco, Coyoacán and the historical city centre. It was funny seeing the places where we used to live and eat and also to see how much the city has changed. The traffic is as bad as always and we found this time that the easiest way to move around the city was in taxi because not even the metro was working properly.

It’s very difficult to find proper Mexican food in Hong Kong (burrito is NOT Mexican food!) so we were eager to try all the food we’ve been missing, like tacos al pastor with coriander and lime, Mexican style eggs, divorced eggs (see photo below, they’re basically 2 fried eggs covered with 2 types of sauce, one red and one green) and much more. My favourite restaurant is Casa de los Azulejos in the historical centre, not only the food is great, the restaurant is in a beautiful building and the waitresses wear cute traditionally inspired uniforms.

It’s hard to imagine that a big archeological site such as Teotihuacán is only a couple of hours away from Mexico City. The easiest way to get there is to go to the North bus terminal and get a direct bus. Once there it’s super easy to find the pyramids and walk around the site. Of the two main pyramids, it’s only possible to climb all the way to the top of the Sun pyramid and although it’s a little bit challenging, the view from up there is worth it.

We were supposed to meet some friends to go together in a trajinera (colourful boats that can be found in Xochimilco, in the south of the city) but they all turned out to be flaky and stood us up; nevertheless we went on the boat and enjoyed the unusual experience and also hired a mariachi band to play a few songs!